Instructions:
Download the ISO of your choice using one of the torrents from the above link, if you don't know which version to get then go with the Live One KDE4 ISO which is a combined live bootable CD and install disc and comes with official ATI and Nvidia drivers and Adobe flash plugin included:

If the ISO checksum is OK then burn the ISO to CD. Else download again.
Burn at no greater than 8x on good quality media.

Once you have burned the CD, boot from it and experience Mandriva straight-away, as it starts up off CD into a Live desktop environment. Once the KDE4 desktop has started you can double-click on the 'Live Install' icon on the desktop to commence installation.

First things to do after installation:

Add the offical package repositories:
Open the Mandriva Control Center (MCC, blue screen icon with round red tool mini-icon on the taskbar, also called 'Configure Your Computer'), select "Software Management" and then "Configure media sources for install and update".
Click on "Add" on the right side and the follow the instructions to add a full set of sources.

Add the PLF package repositories:
Open the following site with Firefox:http://easyurpmi.zarb.org/
Select the Version (2010.0) and the Architecture (i586) and then click on "Add PLF medias".

After that the first thing to do would be to install libdvdcss (which is in the PLF repository) to be able to watch and/or back-up retail DVDs.
Every time you would like to install a package (for example of mplayer or myth or vlc) and you have the choice between an official Mandriva version (mdv) or a PLF version (plf), always chose the PLF version as those contain all the extra codecs that Mandriva cannot include in the official version for legal/patent/licensing issues.
PLF versions are as reliable as the official versions, in fact they are made by the same people, they just can't be branded officially by Mandriva.

MythTV 0.22 rpms for Mandriva Linux 2010.0:
MythTV rpms for Mandriva Linux 2010.0 are available in the Mandriva repositories, you can simply install them through the package manager (drakrpm, "install & remove software" tool)

Brief history of Mandriva:
(from distrowatch.com)
'Mandriva Linux was launched in 1998 under the name of Mandrake Linux, with the goal of making Linux easier to use for everyone. At that time, Linux was already well-known as a powerful and stable operating system that demanded strong technical knowledge and extensive use of the command line; MandrakeSoft saw this as an opportunity to integrate the best graphical desktop environments and contribute its own graphical configuration utilities to quickly become famous for setting the standard in Linux ease of use. In February 2005, MandrakeSoft merged with Brazil's Conectiva to form Mandriva S.A., with headquarters in Paris, France. The company's flagship product, Mandriva Linux, offers all the power and stability of Linux to both individuals and professional users in an easy-to-use and pleasant environment.'

Mandriva Linux uses the rpm package format, same as Redhat, Fedora, and Suse and was originally derived from Redhat Linux so it still has many similarities with Redhat and Fedora, which makes it very easy for anyone with Redhat or Fedora experience to find their way around Mandriva.

Hopefully, I'll be upgrading my HTPC in the next couple weeks. When that happens, I'm wiping Ubuntu and putting Mandriva on it! I'm excited! I tried the RC2 live CD on my Macbook (when looking for a replacement to OS X...I settled on OpenSuse 11.2) and it looked nice and worked well! Very seemless, not buggy at all, the Control Center is fancy as always. I couldn't get the wireless to work on the Macbook but that's neither here nor there since my HTPC is not wireless.

Should I load Mandriva Free or One? What proprietary drivers does One come with? I'm not worried about the Vid card driver since I'll download the one from NVidia's site or find a 190 .rpm.

Could I install Free and then use the NVidia repo and .rpms? Or would it still be better to use One? What other proprietary drivers and software does One include?

I have the same question for my new HTPC build (which will be using on-board nvidia 8300).

In the past I had installed mandriva "free" a lot of times on my eee via FTP, using the all.img / usb method outlined here, it would be great if i can do a 2010 install the same way on my HTPC and then install latest nvidia drivers via backports or separate rpm.

Could I install Free and then use the NVidia repo and .rpms? Or would it still be better to use One? What other proprietary drivers and software does One include?

Yes you can install Free and then install Nvidia drivers from the repo later, but why do things manually when you can have them done automatically from the beginning?

Basically all different install versions (One, Free, Powerpack, Free dual) have access to exactly the same packages once installed and once you have added the repositories, the only difference between them is the initial default set of packages that get's installed.

'One' contains the ATi and Nvidia proprietary drivers, several other non-free firmware packages needed for specific hardware like wireless adapters and the Adobe Flash plugin, so by installing from the 'One' CD you get best support for your hardware straightaway without having to add packages manually later on (and having to find out which ones you need...).

The Free CD or DVD contains only free (as in speech) open source packages, absolutely no binary stuff.

This is the first Linux distro version I have tried so far where I didn't feel the need to disable and uninstall Pulseaudio immediately as sound is working fine out of the box with Pulseaudio as far as I have tested it.

Also the default setup of KDE 4.3.2 in Mandriva 2010.0 is very good, I don't miss KDE 3.5 as much as I did with all previous KDE4 releases.

I just measured the boot time of Mandriva 2010.0 from the grub screen to the KDM login screen on my test PC, it's 24 seconds, quite good considering this is with a 5400rpm 2.5" laptop hard disk, but it's the same as Mandriva 2009.1 (on this same PC).

So I downloaded 2010.0 One last night and burned it. I booted it on my Macbook just to see if the wireless issue with it had been resolved from the RC2 release to the final. It hadn't, Mandriva still won't connect to my AP via wireless so I'm still going to run OpenSuse 11.2 on the Macbook when it's released next week. I was pleasantly surprised at the changes made to the UI from RC2 to final release though! It is a very nice looking and polished OS!

Should Mint be one of them, though, or should it be a Ubuntu/Mint sticky? Mint is so close to Ubuntu that someone could easily use Ubuntu's repos with barely an issue. It's a great distro, but not 'separate' enough from Ubuntu IMO.

Should Mint be one of them, though, or should it be a Ubuntu/Mint sticky? Mint is so close to Ubuntu that someone could easily use Ubuntu's repos with barely an issue. It's a great distro, but not 'separate' enough from Ubuntu IMO.

I LOVE the idea though!

Good point, and I was thinking the same thing. The point would be to announce/discuss/test/report on the particular distro release and media PC issues unique to each distro.

While Mint is a superset of Ubuntu, each release varies in how much it deviates from the base Ubuntu. Mint releases are usually a month or more after the Ubuntu release its based on. I guess when Mint 8 is released, I can rename the "Official Ubuntu Karmic" thread to "Official Karmic/Mint 8" and add the relevant notes, links, torrents, etc. Good idea.

The same could be said of Mandriva, which is a "superset" or fork of Fedora/Red Hat.

I figure if we keep it to the top five at distrowatch, that keeps it simple and manageable. If a distro loses popularity in distrowatch's rankings, then another distro may become a sticky instead.

Remember- this forum is about HTPC's/media PC's. Not all distros are suited for the task, either for packaging quality/breath/depth, or other reasons.

The same could be said of Mandriva, which is a "superset" or fork of Fedora/Red Hat.

Mandriva was a fork of Redhat 12 years ago, these days it's independent. This is already clear if you consider that Mandriva 2010.0 was released before Fedora 12 (which is still in beta).

As both Mandriva and Fedora/Redhat are rpm based they are still similar but while Mint is a fork every 6 months of each new Ubuntu release, Mandriva is certainly not a fork of any current distro release these days.

In any case, as the thread starter of this thread I certainly agree to make this thread sticky, but I think discussion about other distros and whether to make new threads sticky for those too, are OT in this thread.

That said, I think there should be sticky threads for any current distro that is in use here by members of this forum and even more importantly for which there is a forum member using the distro and willing to start a thread about it, distrowatch popularity doesn't matter, usage by members of this forum matters.

That said, I think there should be sticky threads for any current distro that is in use here by members of this forum and even more importantly for which there is a forum member using the distro and willing to start a thread about it, distrowatch popularity doesn't matter, usage by members of this forum matters.

Not to belabor and continue to be OT, but as long as a distro specific thread addresses useful HTPC related issues that solve media PC needs, and the thread has enough contributions and is current enough, then sure it should be sticky while relevant.

If someone wants to continue this particular discussion, feel free to start another thread. In the meantime, I'll request that this thread be made sticky. Again, when the next major Mandriva release happens, a similar new thread can be started, made sticky once populated with useful info, and this one un-stuck to fall off naturally.

Good point, and I was thinking the same thing. The point would be to announce/discuss/test/report on the particular distro release and media PC issues unique to each distro.

While Mint is a superset of Ubuntu, each release varies in how much it deviates from the base Ubuntu. Mint releases are usually a month or more after the Ubuntu release its based on. I guess when Mint 8 is released, I can rename the "Official Ubuntu Karmic" thread to "Official Karmic/Mint 8" and add the relevant notes, links, torrents, etc. Good idea.

The same could be said of Mandriva, which is a "superset" or fork of Fedora/Red Hat.

I figure if we keep it to the top five at distrowatch, that keeps it simple and manageable. If a distro loses popularity in distrowatch's rankings, then another distro may become a sticky instead.

Remember- this forum is about HTPC's/media PC's. Not all distros are suited for the task, either for packaging quality/breath/depth, or other reasons.

for some strange reason Mandy 2010 is frequently crashing for me, I am using the 32bit KDE (4.3.2) "one" version.

The system freeze occurs when I am trying to copy files from my external HDD (fat32, connected via usb) to one of my internal hard drve partitions (JFS). [new HTPC build, migrating data from spare drive to the new htpc] The system is rendered useless when freeze happens, only option is to reboot (X, kb, mouse nothing works, no clt-alt-f2, nothing..)

Initially I thought that maybe its dolphin (1 out of 5 times it will get stuck), so I tried konqueror, but sometimes konqueror fails as well.

Can someone please tell me which system logs I need to check to investigate the issue.

P.S. I was excited with my new build & mandriva 2010, but these frequent system crashes are killing the enthusiasm.......I love KDE/Mandriva and dont want to move to other distro...

for some strange reason Mandy 2010 is frequently crashing for me, I am using the 32bit KDE (4.3.2) "one" version.

The system freeze occurs when I am trying to copy files from my external HDD (fat32, connected via usb) to one of my internal hard drve partitions (JFS). [new HTPC build, migrating data from spare drive to the new htpc] The system is rendered useless when freeze happens, only option is to reboot (X, kb, mouse nothing works, no clt-alt-f2, nothing..)

That is very unusual and I would strongly suspect a hardware issue, to begin with I would do a memtest to see if maybe you have defective memory.
See here for how to do this:http://www.linuxtech.net/tips+tricks...stics-pt1.html
Let it run for 12-24 hours don't just do one pass as one pass sometimes is not enough.

Also make sure the BIOS is set on sane values, especially with regards to memory voltage and timing and system frequencies.

Also check that your system is not overheating for some reason, install the lm_sensors package to monitor temperatures.

If you are using the 3D desktop effects (compiz etc) try disabling those too, to be safe.

Have a look in /var/log/messages, but I doubt you find anything relevant in there, system freezes hardly ever generate entries in the logs.